The girls were sixth-graders from a religious school in central Israel. They were on a bat mitzva tour of the Cave of Machpela in Hevron, a site recognized by the government as an official heritage site, when four terrorists ambushed it with firebombs.

The mother of one of the girls, who was accompanying the trip, told Arutz Sheva that the ambush had been well planned. She described moments of horror when the firebombs exploded, one after the other, on the bus's windows, east of the Halhoul bridge, as the bus made its way back from Hevron.

"This was a bat mitzva trip that had been approved by the Ministry of Education, which included a visit to Rachel's Tomb. The buses were bulletproofed and had an armed guard,” she said.

Chananel, the woman's son, whose sister had been on the bus, wrote on Facebook on Tuesday: “Three firebombs exploded on the bus. It was a direct hit. The bus was engulfed in flames and the girls and the mothers in the bus screamed, cried, leaned down toward the floor. There was a smell of burnt plastic.

"This time, it ended without injury. The driver stepped on the gas and the bus was fortified. The traumatic effects are not known at this point... I don't even want to write how it could have ended."

A bit of history, as well

Arutz Sheva was founded in 1988, after Rabbanit Shulamit
Melamed experienced an attack on a bus she was in, and was shocked to
hear the radio report about the event,
which made it sound as if the Jews on the bus had been the attackers
and not the victims. She turned to her husband, Beit El co-founder Rabbi
Zalman Melamed, who established Arutz Sheva together with Beit El co-founder Yaakov "Ketzaleh" Katz.

The incident Tuesday in Hevron proves, sadly, that more than 25 years down the line, the problem that made Arutz Sheva necesary has only gotten worse.